


burning

by rarmaster



Category: Sonic the Hedgehog (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, i have no explanation for this, imagine if they'd gone somewhere fucking INTERESTING with her housing a literal god in her veins, it's just a genuine fic about elise from sonic 06
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-23
Updated: 2018-01-23
Packaged: 2019-03-08 11:46:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13457586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rarmaster/pseuds/rarmaster
Summary: She found herself staring at the artwork depicting Solaris often when her duties left her with any free time. She wondered if this burning feeling inside her was anything like what Solaris felt. (A part of her knew it was.)





	burning

**Author's Note:**

> When she was younger, Elise had spent hours and hours admiring the paintings and sculptures and other artwork that decorated the castle—all the things that depicted Solaris. She had stood in front of them and imagined what it might be like to be Solaris. She imagined what it might feel like, being burning and powerful and eternal.

She wasn’t told a lot about how her father had died, though she’d been there for some of it. An experiment gone wrong. Solaris was angry. The candle that was on display in the throne room, burning endlessly—it didn’t burn anymore.

Elise was too young to fully take the throne, but with the help of her advisors she ran the country. She ran the country, she took her father’s teaching to heart, and she was strong. She was a strong queen (well, princess still,) for her country. She led them since her father could not.

It was... fine. It was her duty, and though it was a heavy thing to shoulder, she knew it was always her burden to bear, at some point or another.

It was fine, but there was something burning inside her—something that had burned inside her ever since her father died. At first, when she was younger, the advisors had called it grief. When she got older, they called it stress.

If Elise had to describe it, she’d call it fire.

A fire, in her stomach, in her veins, under her skin.

And it was…. Something else, too. Something much harder to describe.

It was feelings, she got, when she studied the history of Soleanna, of Solaris—feelings like she knew these things better than her teachers, feelings like she had _been there._ It was a boiling rage that settled in her stomach, from time to time, a roiling anger that was much bigger than her body, a fire that threatened to consume her.

She found herself staring at the artwork depicting Solaris often when her duties left her with any free time. She wondered if this burning feeling inside her was anything like what Solaris felt. (A part of her knew it was.)

 

 

This wasn’t the first year she’d felt sick before the annual Festival of the Sun. It was routine, ever since her father died and she had to take over the proceedings. Stress, her advisors told her. Elise wished she could believe them.

This year, it was worse than all others.

She didn’t feel sick. Actually, she never had.

She felt impatient. Felt the fire inside her roiling just short of rage. There was something inside her that wanted to burn, consume, destroy. Images of Soleanna on fire danced in her mind. Solaris was angry.

(For as long as Elise could remember, Solaris had always been angry.)

She was scared. She’d never felt like this before—never _quite_ this angry, and the visions were new. They terrified her.

She couldn’t talk to her advisors about it, though. They would either dodge her questions or blow it off like she was making things up. So she bottled it up, instead, and didn’t let herself feel it.

Perhaps, that was a mistake.

She got about halfway through the ceremony when the anger in her stomach and the visions still swimming in her mind became too much. She staggered and collapsed, the worried shouts of her advisors and her attendants and the crowd all drowned in the sound of roaring flames, roaring like a voice.

_“ **Y O U  L I V E  O N  B O R R O W E D  T I M E.** ”_

They told her they got the ceremony completed just fine, but Elise did not remember the rest of that night.

All she knew was that the heat on her skin and the voice and flames she’d heard were apparently just her imagination.

 

 

Elise found, in later years, that she could summon fire to her. Not much—or, she dared not _try_ to summon much—but it was easy to snap her fingers and produce a small, white, warm flame. It was a comfort that eased the distress and anger that continued to burn inside her chest.

None of her advisors knew, and none of her maids did, either. She wasn’t sure how to tell them, nor did she see any point in doing so. They’d call it dangerous, though as far as Elise was concerned, it was the safest thing she knew.

It reminded her of the flame that used to burn on the candle in the throne room.

Now, as she sat in her cell, held captive by Eggman, she summoned the flame to her and soaked in its comforting warmth.

It was a small flame, white and gentle, fitting easily in the palm of her hand. She wondered, as she passed her fingers over the top of it (it didn’t burn her. It never had.) if she could make it bigger. If she could make it big enough, surely she could fight of Eggman’s bots. It was a nice thought.

But she didn’t dare.

A small flame she could handle, but she feared if she let any more than that out things could… take a turn for the worst. The burning beneath her skin was strong, and if she let herself really feel it? What would happen, then? Would she be able to control it?

‘ _The Flames of Disaster’,_ Eggman had said, and he’d looked right at her.

The burning feeling that had become such a constant, in her life, since Solaris had gotten angry and her father had died and the flame in the throne room had gone out—

It… It _couldn’t_ be.

Could it?

 

 

“I won’t do it,” she told Eggman, indignantly, as he paced the room around her. She’d been given a chair to sit in, but sit she did not. “I will _not_ release Solaris on my people!”

It would be easy, and the fire in her gut burned stronger than it ever had before, but… No. She’d seen visions of Soleanna on fire in her dreams—and even waking—often enough. She did not wish to see it for real.

“Ah, but surely Princess—” Eggman began, but Elise did not let him finish.

“ _No._ ” It was easy, to snap. It was nice, to let herself feel the things that had been boiling inside her for so long.

(She had been angry, for as long as she could remember.)

“I will _not_ let him out just so _you_ can- can rule over _time_!” Elise spat. She was angry that he wanted this. Angry that he wanted to use something so powerful just for his own gain. She couldn’t stand the thought of being used again. (Again…? And, wait a minute—) “You will _not_ make me!”

Eggman smiled.

“Unfortunately, I’m afraid you don’t have a choice.”

Elise swallowed.

“Actually,” she said, and her voice was crisp. Her insides were raw. “I’m afraid I do.”

Turning, summoning more fire to her hands than she had ever dared before, she blasted the computer console with her flames.

Eggman’s ship fell out of the sky.

 

 

She and Sonic were on their way back to Soleanna, after he had rescued her from Eggman’s plummeting aircraft, and after he had sent Eggman packing. It was a relief, to be rid of Eggman. And the fire burning in her gut?

Well, Elise had lived with that for more than half her life, now.

It still burned, and she was sure she’d be sick with it again, sooner rather than later.

But she was used to it, and she hardly gave it a thought as she laughed with Sonic, relishing in their victory.

They were coming into a clearing of the forest when she felt it.

A presence, tugging at the edge of her mind. A familiarity.

“Elise…?” Sonic’s voice, concerned, as she stopped dead in her tracks and turned around.

Standing between the trees was a figure. He looked to be made of dark crystal, formed into a shape that was an echo of Sonic’s. But that was not what caught Elise’s attention.

What caught her attention was the sudden, intense roiling in her gut.

She had never met him before—of course she hadn’t, she’d _remember_ it if she’d ever seen a crystalline hedgehog—but there was still… She felt like she knew him. Like something inside her knew him as well as she knew herself.

He’d had his hand raised, but he lowered it now, as he met eyes with Elise. Something cold slid down Elise’s spine. Slowly, he approached.

Sonic slid in front of Elise, throwing his arms to protect her. “Stay back, Mephiles!” he shouted.

“Mephiles…?” Elise repeated, tasting the name on her tongue. That, she was not familiar with, but there was still something beating hard in her chest.

“You feel it, don’t you?” Mephiles asked, as if he hadn’t heard Sonic. His eyes remained locked with Elise’s. “The burning. The hunger.”

“I… I don’t…” Elise began, but her mouth was too dry to continue. She wanted to blow it off. She hadn’t told Sonic about the burning that raged inside of her, and hadn’t intended to, but there was no denying it. Especially not here, not now. She’d never felt it so strongly in her entire life.

“You hold Iblis, inside of you,” Mephiles continued. “I can see him burning in your eyes. You know what we used to be.”

It was not Solaris, inside of her. Only half of him. That she was certain of, now, and not just because she’d been told so. She could feel it. Not just an anger, burning in her stomach. But an emptiness. A longing.

She clutched at her stomach, and took a step back.

“Elise!” Sonic turned to her, knelt down next to her as she collapsed to her knees. “Elise, are you—”

“That burning, you feel. That emptiness. You don’t have to feel it any longer,” Mephiles said. Her gaze had dropped to the ground, away from his eyes, but she could still feel them boring into her.

“I- I _won’t_ let Soleanna burn,” Elise said, through gritted teeth. The fire inside her longed to break free. To burst out from her. (To consume to destroy to _be whole_.)

“It won’t burn.” The sincerity in Mephiles’ voice was so heavy she wanted to believe him.

She wanted to believe him, but she knew the anger that roiled in her belly well. Images of Soleanna burning danced before her eyes. She squeezed them shut and bowed her head. Solaris’ anger was hot inside her. (But it wasn’t Solaris, it was Iblis, and if she let him out would he…?)

It felt like she was burning from the inside out.

“Princess, listen to me.” Despite the roaring in her ears, and the fact she could barely focus on anything that wasn’t the fire inside of her, Mephiles’ voice came through clearly. “Don’t you long to be free from that anger? From that burden? You won’t have to feel the wrath of his flames any longer.”

How nice, that would be.

“Elise! Don’t!”

But Sonic couldn’t stop her, wouldn’t stop her. No one could stop her now.

Elise gathered up all the fire in her veins, all the rage and the pain that burned inside her. She gathered these things up, she took them, and she set them free. She threw her head back, and roared with the voice of a god who had lived in her veins for years. She set Iblis free.


End file.
